A blog provided for those friends from Canonsburg,Pa to share, think back, indulge in a few memories and hopefully re-connect on a friendship that has distanced from you...
As I've said before: "Who had it better than us!"...enjoy, Dick Garboski

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Thursday, April 29, 2010

The United States Postal Service deserves a standing ovation for something that's going to happen this month: Bill Mauldin is getting his own postage stamp.

Mauldin died at age 81 in the early days of 2003. The end of his life had been rugged. He had been scalded in a bathtub, which led to terrible injuries and infections; Alzheimer's disease was inflicting its cruelties. Unable to care for himself after the scalding, he became a resident of a California nursing home, his health and spirits in rapid decline.

He was not forgotten, though. Mauldin, and his work, meant so much to the millions of Americans who fought in World War II, and to those who had waited for them to come home. He was a kid cartoonist for Stars and Stripes, the military newspaper; Mauldin's drawings of his muddy, exhausted, whisker-stubbled infantrymen Willie and Joe were the voice of truth about what it was like on the front lines.

Mauldin was an enlisted man just like the soldiers he drew for; his gripes were their gripes, his laughs were their laughs, his heartaches were their heartaches. He was one of them. They loved him.

He never held back. Sometimes, when his cartoons cut too close for comfort, his superior officers tried to tone him down. In one memorable incident, he enraged Gen. George S. Patton, and Patton informed Mauldin he wanted the pointed cartoons -- celebrating the fighting men, lampooning the high-ranking officers -- to stop. Now.

The news passed from soldier to soldier. How was Sgt. Bill Mauldin going to stand up to Gen. Patton? It seemed impossible.

If, in your line of work, you've ever considered yourself a young hotshot, or if you've ever known anyone who has felt that way about himself or herself, the story of Mauldin's young manhood will humble you. Here is what, by the time he was 23 years old, Mauldin had accomplished:

He won the Pulitzer Prize. He was featured on the cover of Time magazine. His book "Up Front" was the No. 1 best-seller in the United States .

All of that at 23. Yet when he returned to civilian life and he grew older, he never lost that boyish Mauldin grin, he never outgrew his excitement about doing his job, he never big-shotted or high-hatted the people with whom he worked every day.

I was lucky enough to be one of them; Mauldin roamed the hallways of the Chicago Sun-Times in the late 1960s and early 1970s with no more officiousness or air of haughtiness than if he was a copyboy. That impish look on his face remained.

He had achieved so much. He had won a second Pulitzer Prize, and he should have won a third, for what may be the single greatest editorial cartoon in the history of the craft: his deadline rendering, on the day President John F. Kennedy was assassinated, of the statue at the Lincoln Memorial slumped in grief, its head cradled in its hands. But he never acted as if he was better than the people he met. He was still Mauldin the enlisted man.

During the late summer of 2002, as Mauldin lay in that California nursing home, some of the old World War II infantry guys caught wind of it. They didn't want Mauldin to go out that way. They thought he should know that he was still their hero.

Gordon Dillow, a columnist for the Orange County Register, put out the call in Southern California for people in the area to send their best wishes to Mauldin; I joined Dillow in the effort, helping to spread the appeal nationally so that Bill would not feel so alone. Soon more than 10,000 letters and cards had arrived at Mauldin's bedside.

Even better than that, the old soldiers began to show up just to sit with Mauldin, to let him know that they were there for him, as he, long ago, had been there for them. So many volunteered to visit Bill that there was a waiting list. Here is how Todd DePastino, in the first paragraph of his wonderful biography of Mauldin, described it:

"Almost every day in the summer and fall of 2002 they came to Park Superior nursing home in Newport Beach, California, to honor Army Sergeant, Technician Third Grade, Bill Mauldin. They came bearing relics of their youth: medals, insignia, photographs, and carefully folded newspaper clippings. Some wore old garrison caps. Others arrived resplendent in uniforms over a half century old. Almost all of them wept as they filed down the corridor like pilgrims fulfilling some long-neglected obligation."

One of the veterans explained to me why it was so important:

"You would have to be part of a combat infantry unit to appreciate what moments of relief Bill gave us. You had to be reading a soaking wet Stars and Stripes in a water-filled foxhole and then see one of his cartoons."

Mauldin is buried in Arlington National Cemetery . This month, the kid cartoonist makes it onto a first-class postage stamp. It's an honor that most generals and admirals never receive.

What Mauldin would have loved most, I believe, is the sight of the two guys who are keeping him company on that stamp.

Tuesday, April 27, 2010

This picture was really a blast from the past for me. I know everyone in the front row by name and several of the other players by name also. I can't see any of the coaches in the picture but I'm thinking that was about the time of Tony Paesano, Val ?, Mike Pantely, ? Costa or possibly even Al Como. See if anyone knows. I am #16 in the top row...Bill Burgess.

Thanks for your blog.

Sunday, April 25, 2010

A graduate of Canonsburg High School, University of Pittsburgh and West Virginia University. He became Canonsburg & Canon McMillan High School's Track & Cross Country Teams from 1953 thru 1961. Head coach, Track and Cross Country at the University of Pittsburgh from 1966 thru 1975. His dual meet record was 72-26, raising Pitt into an eastern power. He coached 18 Eastern and 4 Individual NCAA Champions, 28 All-Americans and his 1971 Distance Medley Team set the World Record. He also introduced the Pitt Invitational, a National showcase of collegiate talent. In 1973 Banner became head coach of the United States All-Star Track squad and traveled abroad to West Germany, Austria, Italy, the Soviet Union and West Africa. The Americans defeated all, but fell to the Russians by a mere four points.

At Carnegie Mellon University he became a highly successful and respected Athletic Director and served from 1975 thru 1988. He elevated the athletic department to a position of prominence among NCAA Division III schools. During his tenure CMU won over 25 conference championships and has been represented in many NCAA Regional and National Championship events.

This outstanding gentleman entered the U.S. Marine Corps during the Korean War and was decorated with a Silver Star and a Purple Heart. He was inducted into the Hall of Valor at Soldiers & Sailors Hall in Oakmont, Pennsylvania.

A legend in the wrestling circles of America and has a success almost unparalleled in collegiate athletics. At Canonsburg High School he was a three time WPIAL wrestling champion 1957-'58 & `59 and a 1959 PIAA champion and PIAA runner-up in 1957-'58. In high school he won 70 consecutive dual matches.

At Moorhead State University he won three national championships, the 1962 NAIA 123# National Champion and 1963 NAIA 123# and NCAA Division I 115# National Champion. He is only the second wrestler to win two wrestling national titles in one year.

He has completed his 40th year as head coach of North Dakota State University. He is only the second wrestling coach at NDSU and has compiled an outstanding record of 408 - 112 - 11 a winning percentage of .776. He has led NDSU 38 consecutive winning dual meet seasons, in his 40 year coaching career.

He has coached 21 wrestlers to 30 NCAA Division II individual championships and 20 wrestlers as NCAA runnerup. Coached 158 All-Americans in NCAA Division II and led NDSU to four NCAA Division II National Team championships (1988-'98-'00-'01) six NCAA Division II National Team Runners-up along with six third places finishes. NDSU has won 17 North Central Conference Championships including nine straight from 1982 thru 1990. His teams have finished in the Top Five of the nation in NCAA Division 1 127 times and in the Top Ten 32 times.
A tireless promoter of wrestling Maughan is a leader in the success of the USA Wrestling Junior and Cadet National Championships hosted annually in Fargo, North Dakota, where over 3600 athletes participate each summer.

He is a past President of the NCAA Division II Wrestling Coaches Association, member of the NAIA and NCAA Division II Halls of Fame, and named one of the top 10 All-Time College Wrestling Coaches by Wrestling Magazine. Honored as a Distinguished Member of the National Wrestling Hall of Fame, Class of 2003.

A graduate of Moorhead State University, he earned his B.S. Degree in English and a Master

Thursday, April 22, 2010

Andrew J. Puchany of Canonsburg, wrestled for Canonsburg High School from 1936 through 1939 winning four WPIAL championships and a state title.

He also won two WPIWAA and four AAU championships.

Puchany, after duty in the service, entered Indiana University in 1946 and placed in the Big 10 tournament four years, capturing a championshlp in 1948.

He coached at Canonsburg and later at Canon-McMillan High School from 1952 through 1970 and had five undefeated seasons with more than 60 WPIAL individual champion and obtained college scholarships for many of his wrestlers.

Puchany won the first Washington County Wrestling Coach of the Year award given by Washington Knights of Columbus and received the honor three more times.

Bowled there and at the KSKJ up the hill. 4 or 5 of us would walk there and back on Sat. night. I would start at Collefe and Greenside and we would pick up friends along the way.Once in a great while someone would have the use of the family car otherwise, it was quite a hike carrying a 16 pound Brunswick.